Learn about the 'Call the Midwife' cast's stage work

From Poplar to the West End, learn about the stage credits of the Call the Midwife cast, including Helen George who appears in High Society this summer.

Summary

• Helen George stars in High Society at the Barbican this summer; The ensemble cast includes veteran actors Jenny Agutter; Judy Parfitt and Linda Bassett; The show also provided a springboard for Jessica Raine and Emerald Fennell

Poplar calling! It’s hard to believe that the BBC’s Call the Midwife is now on its 15th series. Based on Jennifer Worth’s memoirs about working as a district nurse and midwife in London’s East End in the 1950s alongside a nursing order of nuns, Heidi Thomas’s show really has captured the public imagination with its candid and compassionate handling of an enormous spectrum of medical and social issues.

Female-led and fiercely feminist, featuring a host of highly skilled, loveable, and eccentric characters, the show has covered the newly founded NHS, mental health, birth defects, domestic abuse, the Thalidomide scandal, the introduction of the birth control pill, the legalisation of abortion, LGBTQ+ rights, and much more. It’s social history at its most moving and immediate.

The show features a multigenerational cast that includes experienced character actors and up-and-coming talent. It’s no surprise that many of the actors also have impressive theatre careers. Read our guide to the actors’ work beyond Nonnatus House as series 15 airs and Helen George, one of the show’s most popular and longest-serving cast members, prepares to stars in High Society at the Barbican this summer, prior to a UK tour.

Additionally, Megan Cusack (Nurse Nancy Corrigan) is currently making her London stage debut in The Playboy of the Western World at the National Theatre, playing Susan Grady and understudying Nicola Coughlan as Pegeen.

Please note that this article may contain spoilers for series 1-14 of Call the Midwife!

Book High Society tickets on LondonTheatre.co.uk.

Helen George

Over the course of the show, it’s possible to argue that it’s Helen George’s superbly capable and sometimes troubled Nurse Trixie Franklin (Lady Aylward) who has emerged as the heroine. George began her career in dance and musical theatre, graduating from the Royal Academy of Music. She made her West End debut in Andrew Lloyd Webber’s The Woman in White and has toured in the title roles in After Miss Julie and My Cousin Rachel, as well as appearing in Terence Rattigan’s Love in Idleness at the Menier Chocolate Factory – LondonTheatre.co.uk’s reviewer called her performance “superb”.

George returned to musical theatre when she toured as governess Anna Leonowens in Bartlett Sher’s production of The King and I (pictured). When the production arrived in the West End in 2024, LondonTheatre.co.uk’s reviewer observed that “George absolutely delivers as this spirited, sharp-witted, slightly entitled, but always scrupulously fair character, who wins us over with a charming combination of strength and warmth”.

In May 2026, George steps into Grace Kelly’s shoes as Tracy Lord in Cole Porter’s High Society at the Barbican Centre. Her natural poise and charm makes her the ideal hostess for what promises to be the summer’s most swell-egant, elegant party,

Book High Society tickets on LondonTheatre.co.uk.

Jessica Raine

Jessica Raine’s newly qualified Nurse Jenny Lee (later Jennifer Worth, the author of the memoirs on which the show is based) was the anchor figure for the first three series. Raine began her career at the National Theatre and the Young Vic, where she earned particular acclaim for her performance as Beatrice-Joanna in The Changeling. When she starred in Arnold Wesker’s Roots at the Donmar Warehouse in 2013, LondonTheatre.co.uk’s reviewer admired the “captivatingly graceful and beautiful Jessica Raine in a performance that glows both inside and out… she’s a huge star in the waiting”. She most recently appeared in James Graham’s Covid romcom Bubble alongside Pearl Mackie (pictured) at the Nottingham Playhouse.

Vanessa Redgrave continues to frame each episode as the voice of the mature Jennifer Worth with her inimitable gravelly tones. Redgrave’s career spans almost 70 years and she has achieved the Triple Crown of Acting with Oscar, Emmy, and Tony wins, plus an Olivier Award.

Jenny Agutter

Forever beloved as Bobbie in the 1970 classic The Railway Children, Jenny Agutter has been in residence as the ever-wise Sister Julienne from the beginning. Agutter attended ballet school before beginning her screen career and she made her stage debut in 1970. She has worked for the National Theatre and the Royal Shakespeare Company, including playing Miranda to John Gielgud’s Prospero and Regan to Michael Gambon’s King Lear. She appeared on Broadway in the play Breaking the Code, which was led by Derek Jacobi as Alan Turing, and in 2007 performed in Equus, starring Daniel Radcliffe, another former child actor who has gone on to have a successful adult career (she won a BAFTA playing a different role in the 1977 film version of Equus).

Judy Parfitt

Now aged 90, Judy Parfitt plays Nonnatus House’s quirkiest resident Sister Monica Joan, formerly a pioneering nurse and midwife. Parfitt began her career in repertory theatre in 1954 and her roles over the decades have included Cleopatra in Antony and Cleopatra, Ranevskaya in The Cherry Orchard, and Eleanor in Passion Play. She made her Broadway debut in a revival of Emlyn Williams’s thriller Night Must Fall, opposite Matthew Broderick in 1999. In 2010, she appeared in Really Old, Like Forty Five at the National Theatre.

Laura Main

Like Helen George, Laura Main’s (Nurse Shelagh Turner/formerly Sister Bernadette) background is in musical theatre. She made her London debut at Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre and she played the roles of Margy Frake and Jeanie in the European premieres of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s State Fair and Me and Juliet respectively, both at the Finborough Theatre. She has also toured in Shrek the Musical and Steel Magnolias (pictured, second from left), and has appeared in several pantomimes.

Miranda Hart

Comedian Miranda Hart was a real scene-stealer as Nurse Camilla “Chummy” Fortescue-Cholmondeley-Browne for the first four series. She made her West End debut as villainous orphanage matron Miss Hannigan in Annie in 2017. LondonTheatre.co.uk’s reviewer was won over: “With her 6'1 frame and fierce presence she owns the stage. And the audience simply adores her: from the moment she makes her first appearance and a cheer goes up, she has them on her side”.

Bryony Hannah

Bryony Hannah played the quietly determined Nurse Cynthia Miller (later Sister Mary Cynthia) for the first six series. She made her West End debut in The Children’s Hour in 2012, in which she stole the show from its stars Keira Knightly and Elisabeth Moss and was nominated for an Olivier Award. Her work at the National Theatre includes War Horse, Earthquakes in London, and The House of Bernarda Alba (pictured).

Emerald Fennell

Emerald Fennell made her first appearance as Nurse Patsy Mount in series two and she returned as a regular throughout series 3-6. For the stage, Fennell provided the book for Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Cinderella (known as Bad Cinderella on Broadway) and she has transitioned into screenwriting with Promising Young Woman, Saltburn and Wuthering Heights, which will be released next month.

Linda Bassett

Linda Bassett joined the cast as the indefatigable Nurse Phyllis Crane in series four, and it’s hard to believe there was ever a time when she wasn’t part of the team. Bassett began her theatrical career in the 1970s and she was part of the original cast of Timberlake Wertenbaker’s Our Country’s Good in 1988. She created the role of Ella Khan in Ayub Khan Din’s East is East in 1996, which she reprised in the film version. She played Jessica Raine's mother in Roots, though the two didn't overlap on the show. She has worked at the Royal Court on numerous occasions, where she most recently appeared in Caryl Churchill’s What If If Lonely.

Leonie Elliott

Leonie Elliott (Nurse Lucille Anderson, series 7-12) made her West End debut as a child in The Lion King. She has also performed in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe at the Birmingham Rep, Concrete Jungle at Riverside Studios, and she played Hortense in Small Island at the National Theatre (pictured). Last summer, she appeared in Liberation, about the 1945 Pan-African Conference, at the Royal Exchange, Manchester.

Fenella Woolgar

Fenella Woolgar played Sister Hilda in series 8-11, and it was lovely to see her again in the recent Christmas special. LondonTheatre.co.uk’s reviewer called her performance as Thea Elvsted in Hedda Gabler “immensely impressive”. Other significant roles include Margaret Thatcher in Moira Buffini’s comedy Handbagged and the lonely Miss Roach in Hampstead Theatre’s adaptation of Patrick Hamilton’s The Slaves of Solitude (pictured).

The show has also featured recurring turns from Miriam Margolyes (Mother Mildred), Harriet Walter (Sister Ursula), Dorothy Atkinson (Jane Sutton), Cheryl Campbell (Lady Browne), and Olly Rix (Matthew Aylward), as well as guest appearances from Monica Dolan, Sinead Cusack, Stella Gonet, Richard Fleeshman, Beverley Klein, Ellie-May Sheridan, Alex Waldmann, Rachel Tucker, Henry Goodman, and many more. Let’s see who enters the clinic in series 15!

Main photo credit: the cast of Call the Midwife. (Courtesy of the BBC). Inset: Helen George, Jessica Raine, Laura Main, Miranda Hart, Bryony Hannah, Emerald Fennell, Linda Bassett, Leonie Elliott, and Fenella Woolgar. (Courtesy of productions); Jenny Agutter and Judy Parfitt. (Courtesy of the BBC).